Introduction Since anaerobic digestion leads to the recovery of energy and nutrients from waste, it is considered the most sustainable method for treating the organic fraction of municipal solid wastes. However, due to the long solid retention time in the anaerobic digestion process, the low performance of the process in biogas production as well as the uncertainty related to the safety of digested materials for utilizing in agriculture, applying different pretreatments is recommended. Thermal pretreatment is one of the most common pretreatment methods and has been used successfully on an industrial scale. Very little research, nevertheless, has been done on the effects of different temperatures and durations of thermal pretreatment on the enhancement of anaerobic digestion of the organic fraction of municipal solid wastes (OFMSW). The main effect of thermal pretreatment is the rapturing cell membrane and dissolving organic components. Thermal pretreatment at temperatures above 170 degrees C may result in the formation of chemical bonds that lead to particle agglomeration and can cause the loss of volatile organic components and thus reduce the potential for methane production from highly biodegradable organic waste. Therefore, since thermal pretreatment at temperatures above 100 degrees C and high pressure requires more energy and more sophisticated equipment, thermal pretreatment of organic materials at low temperatures has recently attracted more attention. According to the researchers, thermal pretreatment at temperatures below 100 degrees C did not lead to the decomposition of complex molecules but the destruction of large molecule clots. The main purpose of this study was to find the optimal levels of pretreatment temperature and time and the most appropriate concentration of digestible materials to achieve maximum biogas production using a combination of the Box Behnken Response Surface Method to find the objective function followed by optimizing these variables by Genetic Algorithm. Materials and Methods In this study, the synthetic organic fraction of municipal solid waste was prepared similar to the organic waste composition of Karaj compost plant. The digestate from the anaerobic digester available in the Material and Energy Research Institute was used as an inoculum for the digestion process. Some characteristics of the raw materials that are effective in anaerobic digestion including the moisture content, total solids, volatile solids of organic waste, and the inoculum were measured. Experimental digesters were set up according to the model used by MC Leod. After size reduction and homogenization, the synthetic organic wastes were subjected to thermal pretreatment (70, 90, 110 degrees C) at specific times (30, 90, 150 min). The Response Surface methodology has been used in the design of experiments and process optimization. In this study, three operational parameters including pretreatment temperature, pretreatment time, and concentration of organic material (8, 12, and 16%) were analyzed. After extracting the model for biogas efficiency based on the relevant variables, the levels of these variables that maximize biogas production were determined using a Genetic Algorithm. Results and Discussion The Reduced Quadratic model, was used to predict the amount of biogas production. The value of the correlation coefficient between the two sets of real and predicted data was more than 0.95. The results suggested that pretreatment time followed by the pretreatment temperature had the greatest contribution (50.86% and 44.81%, respectively) to biogas production. Changes in the organic matter concentration, on the other hand, did not have a significant effect (p < 0.01) on digestion enhancement (1.63%) but were statistically significant at p < 0.10. The response surface diagram showed that the increase in pretreatment time first led to a rise and then a fall in biogas production. The decline in biogas production seemed set to continue with pretreatment time. Meanwhile, the increase in pretreatment temperature from 70 degrees C to 110 degrees C first contributed to higher biogas production and then the decrease in gas production occurred. The reason for this fall was probably the browning and Maillard reaction. The regression model was applied as the objective function for variables optimization using the Genetic Algorithm method. Based on the results of this algorithm, the optimal thermal pretreatment for biogas production was determined at 95 degrees C for 104 minutes and at the concentration of 12%. The expected amount of biogas production by applying the optimal pretreatment conditions was 445 mL-g(-1) VS. Conclusion In this study, the variables including thermal treatment temperature and time as well as the concentration of organic waste to be anaerobically digested were optimized to achieve the highest biogas production from anaerobic digestion. Statistical analysis of the results revealed that the application of thermal pretreatment increased biogas production considerably. According to the regression model, the contribution of pretreatment time and temperature to biogas production was significant (50.86% and 44.81% respectively). In stark contrast, varying substrate concentrations in the range of 8 to 16% had a smaller effect (1.63%) on biogas production. The results of this study also showed that the best pretreatment temperature and time were 95 degrees C and 104 minutes, respectively, at a concentration of 12% by generating 445 mL-g(-1) VS biogas which is 31.17% higher than the biogas yield from anaerobic digestion of untreated organic wastes at this concentration.
